


Birch Broom

by HarveyWallbanger



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Flogging, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-27
Updated: 2020-01-27
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:27:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22437952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HarveyWallbanger/pseuds/HarveyWallbanger
Summary: Avoirdupois.
Relationships: Captain Francis Crozier/Thomas Jopson
Kudos: 29





	Birch Broom

**Author's Note:**

> This story takes place after the events of "A Mercy", and before those of "Horrible From Supper".  
> I am not involved in the production of The Terror. No one pays me to do this. This story and the work it's based upon are fiction. Do not try any of this at home. Thank you, and good night.

The belt does not belong to Thomas. Nor does it have the appearance of belonging to the captain, no monogram or other mark of personality upon it. Holding it in his hands, Thomas examines it further, looking it over for some indication as to its origin, but both it, and he, somehow, are too blank to provide illumination.  
“Thomas?” says the captain.  
Thomas looks up. The captain’s bare shoulders, pale and forming a shallow arc, like a small island rising from the sea, worn smooth by wind and tide, fill his vision. He looks down again. There are freckles on the captain’s shoulders, on his back, and the back of his neck. Thomas makes himself look up. “Yes, sir.”  
“Thomas...” Now, there is uncertainty. It will not do.  
Stepping back, Thomas takes a deep breath.  
He hits the captain with the belt.  
The breath knocked out of him, the captain makes a small sound, between a cough and a sigh.  
“Sir?” Thomas asks, his pulse hammering in his throat.  
“Again, please,” the captain says.  
Thomas takes another deep breath, and strikes. The sound is like clapping hands.  
Why did he wish this?  
Though, Thomas only pretends not to know, to be puzzled.  
He had not been summoned; had not needed to be summoned. Thomas was already there in the captain’s rooms, waiting, because Thomas is always waiting. This was his regular duty, the business of giving report, receiving orders, tidying, setting right, he on the cusp of declaring himself finished, asking the captain if the captain required anything further, before Thomas drifted away again, until the course of his duty brought him back. It was then, that the captain spoke. Perhaps he had also been waiting.  
“I need your help, Thomas,” the captain said, in too soft a voice, as though speaking caused him pain or cost him a great deal.  
A presentiment of danger rose in Thomas. Fighting a sudden feeling of unsteadiness, he moved closer to the captain, so that the captain might not further tax himself in the face of what had already seemed to take so much out of him.  
It was matter of resolution, was the way that the captain put it, turning away as he did, to regard the windows, the twilight world, beyond; a decisive gesture to put an end to something that, though over in fact, still held the feeling of continuing. Like a tune that plays in the mind after the musicians have quit their fiddling, and would animate the body with nervous toil. That was how Thomas thought of it, surprised at this sentiment, and shocked by the sudden sympathy he felt with the captain. It was not the concern one might feel for another, but a complete understanding of that person, through something in common, something shared.  
“I don’t think I am yet free,” the captain said, touching Thomas all the more for his tone of resignation in saying it. He spoke softly, didn’t make any big shows of emotion. He didn’t even name that to which he referred. It seemed, at that moment, to be in the room with them, as though the timbers and furnishings could repeat what had been said, report what had occurred. Thomas knew what the captain said to be true. And what he asked to be necessary. As though the ship, itself, agreed with the assessment, a sudden slow, creaking vibration rattled through the far wall, where stood the cabinet that Captain Fitzjames had fallen against after being struck.  
“I will do whatever you need me to do, sir,” Thomas said.  
Clap.  
The captain breathes in deeply, his shoulders moving with his breaths. The only sounds he makes are these. He doesn’t cry out. He doesn’t speak. But for the fact of the action, the captain could be making the sounds of a deep, but troubled sleep.  
Suddenly, unwished for, unbidden, unexpectedly, comes the image of Thomas’ father, asleep at midday, lying across the bed, arms outstretched, mouth open. How like a specter he’d looked to Thomas, in his white shirt, his snoring so much like an animal’s growl. His slumber was heavy, but treacherous. You might stand at his side and call to him, and receive no answer, but a spoon touching a dish across the house could have him blundering down the corridor to chastise all for their lack of consideration at making such a clamor when they knew him to be asleep.  
Thomas shakes his head.  
Clap.  
Now, comes Thomas’ father in a merrier scene, singing loudly, Thomas’ mother balanced on his knee, clapping along, laughing.  
Clap.  
Perhaps the sound of the belt hitting flesh is something like laughter. Sudden, bitter laughter. Thomas feels something seize within him.  
The captain’s shoulders are no longer pale, but a haze of pink and red where Thomas has hit him. Raised lines mark the blows, though these are increasingly blurred into each other from repetition, one showing a dashed line of rust. In his mind, Thomas is already cleaning and dressing the wounds. Imagining this allows him to go on.  
“Please continue, until I ask you to stop,” the captain said firmly.  
It was to be a test of endurance for both of them. The captain had to have known this. How had he known? It makes Thomas feel strangely hollow to have been so well understood, as though something had been removed from inside of him.  
The captain trembles, seems to falter as though beneath a great burden. Thomas’ arm is beginning to feel weary, stiff. Heat rises up his body, prickling to his throat.  
Clap.  
“Thomas.”  
He drops his hand to his side. “Sir?”  
“That’s enough.”  
Thomas takes a deep breath. “Yes, sir.” Thomas sets the belt aside, reaches for the cloth in the wash basin. He wrings it out, approaches slowly. “Are you ready, sir?”  
“Yes,” the captain says wearily, his posture changing slightly as he braces himself for the sting of the water in new wounds.  
Gently, Thomas dabs at the wounds. They’re angry, ugly things, and for their anger and their ugliness, as well as the pain they cause the captain, Thomas touches them all the more carefully. “How is the pain, sir?”  
“Tolerable,” the captain says.  
Thomas rinses the cloth, wrings it out again. Then, again. Again. Once more. The water in the basin has taken on a pale brown cast. He dries the captain’s shoulders with a clean cloth, then begins to bandage him. “Raise your arms, please, sir,” he says softly. He winds the bandage around the captain. When he stands before the captain, he’s careful to keep his eyes on his work. Regardless of Thomas’ presence, this is something private. The captain should be given his space, to reconcile this however he will. It isn’t for Thomas to know, and he doesn’t want to know. He’s done his part.  
Though it is over, his hands have begun to shake.  
He makes himself breathe in deeply and regularly as he works. Whatever Thomas may feel about his task, it doesn’t require much actual effort, and goes quickly. When he’s finished, he takes his place behind the captain. A small spot of red shows on the bandage. Thomas frowns.  
Slowly, the captain turns around. Thomas puts out his hands, ready to provide a steadying arm, or even something to fall against. The captain keeps his balance, though, standing up straighter as he turns toward Thomas. Then, they are face to face, and Thomas feels himself looking down. It’s less out of any particular emotion than a reflex, like flinching away from the full light of the sun. There is something of that to the captain, something strangely radiant to him, the flush to his face and throat luminous, all the more for the sweat streaking his brow, the wetness of his eyelashes and cheeks. His expression is soft, but Thomas, however unreasonably, anticipates punishment. Thomas did as he was told by the captain, but he still knows it to be wrong, in a way that is separate from duty and obedience. The prospect of punishment, however unlikely, should produce outrage, but it brings only a kind of resting calm, and if it is coming, Thomas will not fight it. He forces himself to look at the captain. As he waits for the captain to speak, he takes out a handkerchief, gently wipes the captain’s brow, his cheeks. The captain catches Thomas’ wrist in his hand.  
When the captain speaks, his voice is hoarse, rusty, as though long unused. The captain says: “Thank you.”  
Thomas opens his mouth to speak, but finds that he cannot think of how to reply. He nods; after a second, merely says, “Sir.”  
“I know that wasn’t easy for you.”  
Again, his mouth opens, he with so little idea of what to say that he may as well have lost the power of speech. He shakes his head. “It was what was required of me,” he says softly.  
The captain is still holding Thomas by the wrist.  
“All the same,” the captain says, releasing Thomas’ wrist, placing his hand on Thomas’ cheek, “it is appreciated. No one else could have done it.”  
Before Thomas can begin to grapple with this newest declaration, another puzzle without hope of solution, the captain draws Thomas to him. At first, Thomas isn’t entirely sure what’s happening. The motion is simple enough and its intended result is obvious, but can the captain mean-  
Is this what he means?  
It is what he means.  
The captain’s mouth meets his, gentle, soft, with unfolding warmth, the captain’s hand still against his cheek.  
“I would show you my gratitude,” the captain says. “If you wished it.”  
He feels the air forced from his lungs, hears the stupid-sounding noise that goes with it. He makes himself close his mouth. He clears his throat. “You don’t have to, sir.”  
“I know I don’t have to.” As he says it, he looks into Thomas’ eyes. Of course, he knows. The captain knows who he is, and he knows who Thomas is. He could do anything to Thomas. Thomas is his to command. The evidence of this is still weeping into a linen bandage. They both know it, but still, Thomas will tell him, everyday, with everything he does. He never wants there to be any doubt in the captain’s mind.  
“Of course, sir.”  
The captain’s expression softens. You’d mistake it for pity if you didn’t know the set of the captain’s features. Thomas knows them, and he knows the captain’s voice. It’s not pity, but reassurance. It’s comfort. “You’ve nothing to fear, Thomas.” It isn’t necessary, but it gladdens Thomas to hear it, all the same. The captain’s attention has a kind of warmth, a pressure, a weight. Thomas would happily let it press down on him.  
“I know that, sir.” He lets himself lean up, press his mouth to the captain’s. The motion makes a kind of clashing within, for being unbidden, but the jagged feeling is immediately subsumed by the warmth he feels, the captain’s mouth against his, open slightly, then opening further, as much ardor in the kiss as affection. His breath is again stolen from him, and Thomas rushes to replace it. The captain’s arms are around him, and Thomas allows himself to place his hands on the captain’s bare shoulders, carefully avoiding the borders of the bandage. The skin is soft, cooled by the air, tender and vulnerable, in contrast to the sureness of the captain’s grasp on Thomas, the certainty of his mouth on Thomas’. He must be in pain. He is in pain, Thomas corrects himself. The thought makes Thomas feel a kind of fear, though, of what, he doesn’t know, for the worst is over. The fear climbs into a thrill, making him greedy for what the captain gives, less for himself than for the captain, to steal the captain’s body away from pain and give it back to pleasure. To fully seal what has just happened in the past with everything else the captain needs to stow there securely.  
“Would you like to go to my bed?” the captain asks.  
“Yes.” He doesn’t have to think before he answers.  
In the captain’s bed, he is embraced again, kissed and caressed, the captain on top of him, heat and weight pressing sighs from Thomas. Cautious of the captain’s wounds, Thomas keeps his hands on the captain’s hips, enjoying the liberty born of necessity, allowing himself the additional pleasure of moving his hands, tracing the lines of the captain’s body. He presses himself up against the captain, holds the captain against him. He touches the captain’s face, smooths back his hair, as he sometimes does while helping the captain dress. The next time he does it, tidying the captain in the course of his duty, will Thomas think of this, now? He knows that he will. He knows that in his thoughts, he’ll be right back here, in the captain’s bed, the captain’s mouth on his. The captain’s knee pressed between his legs. He’ll feel shame, in letting the thought creep in where it doesn’t belong. That shame will be radiant, lighting him up, as desire lights him up, now. There can be enjoyment, Thomas has found, in this kind of shame. It has a kind of voluptuousness, a rich, almost nauseous clenching of the heart and stomach; it is both dependent upon memory and complete in itself. He rubs against the captain’s knee, his hands on the captain’s back, caressing the bare skin between the bandage and the line of his trousers. Thomas will give himself a lot to be ashamed of.  
The captain touches him, first through his clothing, and then, underneath. With each layer of himself breached, opened, Thomas feels himself twist, within and without, his body turning toward the captain, ever more, seeking as he is sought. All the while, the captain’s body is still against him, on top of him, that press that is both such a comfort and such a provocation to the senses. The act, itself, begins to feel secondary to the circumstances that surround it, so that it is merely the punctuation of a long and breathless phrase.  
Breathless.  
Thomas breathes in deeply, makes himself open his eyes, look the captain in the face as he touched.  
“Sir,” he says, because it is incongruous, almost foully so, the mixture of his duty, his place in life with this wholly bodily exchange. Yet, instead of shame, it brings a sweet pang. For, what else is he to call the captain? Not by his name, which belongs to the captain, to give to others as he desires. This, though, is for Thomas, alone. “Sir,” he says again, touches the captain’s face, leans up slightly, hoping that the captain will know what he is asking for. He does. He always knows. He kisses Thomas, still touching. Now, it is almost the end.  
If Thomas makes a sound, the captain swallows it. It is how Thomas would wish it to be; he, always with the captain in some way. This, always with both of them.  
The captain looks down at him, with that soft expression. Now, he kisses Thomas sweetly, almost chastely, at odds with Thomas’ exposure, the captain’s hand still between Thomas’ legs. It is perfect.  
Now, they’re both done.  
Finished.  
Clean.


End file.
